Not one, not two, not just three errors. A half-dozen, at least, and ones that don’t even require significant research to fact-check. That happened in a recent review of Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers show in Boston*, when the writer made mistakes ranging from the number of albums to the theme of certain songs. Many people or companies, when faced with so many egregious mistakes, would demand corrections, retractions, apologies. They would send nasty emails to the writer and vent about the disrespect for months or years. Not Señor Clyne or his band of amigos. Instead, they did what they do night in and night out as an exceptionally hard-working independent band. They raised a glass to the writer. Here’s the thing: The article perfectly captured the loose atmosphere of a Roger Clyne show. It also portrayed his strengths, and his growth, as a songwriter. Even with (or despite) the...

When it comes to the notoriously nasty world of political blogging, is there a line where civil discourse becomes uncivil? Following in the footsteps of another media empire, the Open Container Media Empire has teamed up with itself to try and answer that question. The Open Container Media Empire is the parent of two cats — one of us is wearing a cone and doped up on drugs, but I’ll let you figure out which cat/blogger — and one perfect son. “We believe there is a great opportunity to debate and discuss the important political issues and to include all media outlets, bloggers big and small and raving lunatics on TRAX in our posts. But we believe that all debates can be done in a civil, dignified and respectful manner,” says a statement on, well, okay. This is the statement, but whatever. The OCME statement continued: “We also believe that the...

Two front-page stories in Salt Lake City’s daily newspapers on a speech by LDS elder Dallin Oaks provides a stark example of the failures of the Deseret News as a news organization. In the Trib’s story, they zero in (appropriately) on a comparison that Oaks made to the backlash against Mormons for the anti-gay rights positions to the bloody, and often deadly, abuse blacks suffered during the civil rights fight. In the Deseret News advertorial, the speech is essentially reprinted with transitions added to give it the semblance of a news story. There is no balance, no response. Even more interestingly, the article does not even mention the comparison to the persecution of blacks in the South, nor does the sidebar reprinting of his summary where he made the comparison. The article was written by Scott Taylor, a veteran reporter at the Deseret News who, until relocating to the...

News happens every day. Somedays, it is life-changing, such as a Moon landing, the start of a war, or terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. Some days, it is horrible tragedy that reminds us how often humans are at the mercy of nature. And some days, it is just news. There has to be front page stories every day. That’s a simple fact. And one year after that front page story, it will be the one year anniversary of that story. So what do most people do? Read the news of the day, not the news about the news one year ago. More and more, however, that news from one year ago, or five or ten years, is becoming the news. It’s an insipid trend, especially at the local level. On an almost weekly basis, there are stories about stories from the past billed as current news. (Note: Instead of holding one story out as example, I have decided to paint a broader swath. My...